FEDERMAN'S BLOG [the laugh that laughs at the laugh...]

www.leoscheer.com/spip.php?article1984

Pop ad infinitum

So here it is the first of many reflections,

ah federman already with the evasive pretensions what do you mean reflections? you mean to say obituary

- No he is still living, very much living, he played golf the other day, went to the casino, won ten dollars, for god’s sake- do you think he would like you mentioning that god guy

- oh he wouldn’t mind he is very open minded at this point

- you did say his name in vein

-oy now you too.

So as I was saying I imagine I will write stuff

–better-

like this over and over but upon reflection I realized Federman himself would be the one who would most like to read it, so why wait? Like an espionage agent, he would love to be able to get a glimpse of what is being said about him once he isn’t saying it anymore. Those of you that know him know all too well this is true. So Pop this is for you too. These comments are open to your reflections upon them, edits, critiques, response or even silence

- That would be very uncharacteristic.

– Can’t you find another format for your digressions? The lack of punctuation and these italics interruptions may irritate the reader.

-His readers are extremely patient with all sorts of hijinks

- This is important, the guys fucking obituary after all. Shouldn’t you be more serious and sincere?

- Without the digressions I might wax sentimental and maybe even grim

- That would really bug him he hates those two things

- True, he has spent his life making a point of, an oeuvre of, not talking about the dead at least not sentimentally for god’s sake

- there’s that g-man again

- okay you made that point, let’s carry on

- carry on.

-Shouldn’t we first acknowledge the fact that this whole style thing is bald faced plagiarism

- He spells it playgerism; anyway, he likes that mostly when it is from le source.

- Ah le source, yes, he likes that, the blood, the Federman line, the lineage.

- Hey this is my obituary now you are hijacking it, write your own.

- Oh come on, we can share this one. go on where were we, sorry, I mean you? Oh. Wait! before you go on blame him for the fucked up punctuation and the way it is hard to understand who is talking. Remember you tried to correct it when you worked on sssh but he was stubborn about it. This dramatic dialogue format works well.

- He wasn’t very stubborn we had a great time working together. It made me feel so proud to be his daughter.

-Okay I think we are back to where you need to be, watch the tears though, he hates that and you are getting the keyboard all wet!

Raymond Federman means many things to many people. Hundreds if not thousands of people love him very much, will mourn his passing with profound sorrow. For me it is beyond comprehension. He is my Pop, my best friend, always has been for the last forty six years. Maybe before but I wouldn’t know,

- Ah so you’re thinking you are a fictitious fabrication?

- Only he would know because he is older than I am. He was there before I knew I was.

- He doesn’t always act it, older that is.

- This is not the place for insults.

- It was a loving joke, not an insult; his youthful exuberance is one of his best traits why don’t you mention that.

- I will if you could just control the interruptions, I was just getting on a roll

-d’accord, go ahead.

- Even if he said we had been friends, best friends more than forty six and a half years he might be lying; he is not a very reliable story teller

- You could ask your mother she is more grounded in reality

- Really you think so?

- Okay maybe not, but she has sure helped him.

- As his mother would say “he always has his head in the clouds”

- Well, that is what you say he says she said.

–True that but so it is written, as they say...

So Pop, my Pop and I ARE CLOSE, REAL CLOSE.

-wHOA that was weird why did everything go big all of a sudden? For emphasis?

- No I just hit the “CapsLk” key instead of the shift key I do it all the time.

- You don’t type very well, do you think that is because of all the afternoons you spent in his office after school writing concrete poetry on his IBM Selectric

- Yes the one with the ball, maybe…

He was so loving those afternoons in his beautiful office, on the old campus on Main St. He always made me feel like those poems I wrote, most of them just letters all garbled up not even words, were really brilliant. He has always made me feel like I am brilliant. I hated it when the ball would get jammed. He seemed so smart the way he could get me rolling again making that sound I loved so much. I would hear that sound all the time, the sound of the Selectric.

I used to love the sound when I would hear it stop upstairs on the third floor and then the best sound of all, the sound of his feet gliding down the edges of the stairs as he flew down the stairs, down to the second floor where I was often playing. I used to practice sliding down the front of the steps real quickly like him. I don’t know if it was practice I think I just am a lot like him

- You still are.

- I know, sad isn’t, I will miss him so much.

- Oh don’t start your crying again, “stop your balling” as Patsy would say

- I had terminal cancer I had good reason to cry

- You and your excuses, I suppose you think you have good reason now too, finish your story…

Where was I, where am I going with this? I guess I could start describing the most vivid memories I have of our time together. Being that he is still living and I talk to him every day, usually a few times a day I should probably use the present tense. It may be confusing, this living obituary style is a new form.

- The quotation marks he would have hated, don’t you think?

- Probably, but they do come in handy. Present tense!!..

The last time I saw him he tried to shoot the traffic light like he always did when we were in the car together which was often. He could shoot the light and make it turn green. His aim was not always good but he would just try again and again and eventually he always hit it. I think what is so remarkable about that was the frequency with which he played that game and still does. And every time I still feel amazed by the magic.

- While ridiculing his silliness. Not the last time you saw him forever just most recently.

-This tense shit makes me tense…

I loved our outings. Every Sunday morning we would drive to the drugstore to pick up the New York Times, it is only as an adult I realized it could be delivered. My Pop would buy Gauloises, often a carton always non filtered. He would give me my dollar allowance and I would shop for a Hot Wheel car for my collection. At the cashier he would pretend he didn’t have any more money when I asked him for the $.06 I needed to complete my transaction. The Hot Wheels cost $. 99 with tax $1.07. He always said he didn’t have it he always gave it to me anyway. He still does. He usually says he can’t afford anything then he is very generous, extravagant even.

If my mother asks him to bring her a drink of water he always says “Non” as he reaches for the glass

- What a character, an idiosyncratic individual. Give another example…

When he sees a view he likes to

- Not likes to, it is he can’t control himself.

-Good point- now shut up for a minute...

When he sees a view he goes “Oh lala!” a really great view gets “Oh lalaOhlala merde c’est formidable!” always with a “regarde Simone, regarde Erica!” There was a trip when the three of us drove across Europe. We would stop at many, many view platforms or rather places on the side of the road and he would make us get out of the car and he would always let out an “ Ohlala” sometimes with an exclamation point kind of loud and operatic “Ohlala, Ohlala!” sometimes soft and slow, quietly no exclamation point.”ohlala,olalaola” I used to count how many refrains he would make and I decided the most were at Kotor Yugoslavia. We were on a curvy road up above the village of Kotor. I don’t remember how many “ohlalaOhlalaOhlala”s occurred but it was a lot, believe me, the most ever. I was almost in more awe of his persistence than the view but it was very beautiful. I remember that view, that day very clearly for some reason. Maybe it is because one year later I read in the paper maybe saw it on TV; there had been a horrible earthquake in Yugoslavia and a road had collapsed on a tiny village named Kotor. It was completely destroyed, vanished.

- You still have your memories.

- Oh don’t be trite. This isn’t a sappy movie. I am dealing with the most difficult thing I have ever had to deal with in my entire life, worse than my own illness. I am trying

- You are doing a good job. I’m sorry. It is really hard for me too you know.

On that trip we had a project: to kept track of the best crème caramels in the world. We were the self appointed judges of the European Crème Caramel Competition. We tried them everywhere and ranked each one we tested.

- So which one won, our readers might like to know, this book might actually contain some worthwhile information.

The Best Crème Caramel was definitively anointed at a small restaurant in France- bien sur called Hotel Luberon, I think that is the name of the town too. Might be misspelled

- Maybe you should look it up while I write this damn obituary before we all die!
Mom most likely found the place in the Michelin guide. I think they might have had a bottle of some fancy wine from 1928 that night too. I remember that because that is the year he was born.

-I am starting to think you are making this stuff up!

-Okay maybe that wasn’t the same meal but it was the same trip and his birth date is documented. There are documents, I have seen his birth certificate that he found in the little closet in the bedroom when he went back to the apartment after the war. (Read about it in ssh due in bookstores fall’09) Anyway, what does it matter he won’t remember and makes stuff up all the time.

-He has no memory just fictitious fabrications.

-Is there really any difference?

- Of course not, that much he taught you.

Maybe this would be a good place to insert my published piece Mon Pere le Fictionare

– You are starting to throw in an awful lot of advertisements don’t you think? French no less!

- That’s true it is published in both languages.

-This insertion stuff is so derivative too, it was confusing enough when he did it all the time in Sssh. I thought you were trying to avoid his preclusions

- I think it is too late for that

- Besides your readers have probably already read that damn piece in French or English or heard it at your slide show in Buffalo, you are bugging me a bit the way you are so much like him, kind of creepy

- Oh relax, they can skip over it if they want.

- Well then include the slide show narration, and then the publisher can throw in the photos, people like that. Besides you will probably have a wider readership than he ever did with those Federman A to XXXX books.

- True he is bound to get really famous posthumously.

- Always happens.

- Sad isn’t it he always wanted the notoriety, acclaim.

- He did pretty well for himself.

- Yeah but he wanted to write that one great book the one he would be remembered for.

- Oh he will be remembered no question.

- He wrote a great story in the form of many books.

- Like Proust? Beckett?

- No even better he wrote them like Federman.

- No one like him, just one Federman.

- No one but you.

- True but I think he would be happy I was riding on his coattails.

- He always wa..is so proud of you.

-I love him so much.

- Me too.

-I know you do.

-Is that it? Are we done?

-For now. He isn’t dead yet silly.

-Good point. Done with this installment then.

Chestertown, MD — National Public Radio's Diane Rehm, a living legend of broadcast journalism, addressed the graduates at Washington College's 2009 Commencement ceremonies on Sunday, May 17. Rehm received an honorary degree in addition to being guest speaker at this year's Commencement.

French-American novelist Raymond Federman received an honorary Doctor of Letters along with Rehm, and addressed the graduating class.

Raymond Federman is a French-American novelist and academic, known also for poetry, essays, translations and criticism. He held positions at the University at Buffalo from 1973 to 1999, where he is now Distinguished Emeritus Professor.

Federman is a writer in the experimental style, one that seeks to deconstruct traditional prose. This type of writing is quite prevalent in his book Double or Nothing, in which the linear narrative of the story has been broken down and restructured so as to be nearly incoherent. Words are also often arranged on pages to resemble images or to suggest repetitious themes.

Born in Montrouge, France, Federman emigrated to the U.S. in 1947. He studied at Columbia University and as a graduate at U.C.L.A., where he earned a doctorate in comparative literature on Samuel Beckett. He is also a co-founder of the Fiction Collective, a publishing house dedicated to experimental fiction and its writers.

I am rereading Malone Dies
just to mock death a little
and boost my cancerous spirit.

I shall soon be quite dead at last
Malone tells us at the beginning
of his story.

What a superb opening
what a fabulous sentence.

With such a sentence
Malone announces his death
and at the same time delays it.

In fact all of Malone’s story
is but an adjournment.

Malone even manages
to defer his death
until the end of eternity.

That
soon is such a vague word.

How much time is soon?
Hoe does one measure soon?

Normal people say
I’ll be dead in ten years
or I’ll be dead before I’m eighty
or I’ll be dead by the end of this week
Quite dead at last
Malone specifies.

Unlike Malone prone in bed
scribbling the story of his death
with his little pencil stub
normal standing people
like to be precise
concerning their death.

Oh how they would love
to know in advance
the exact date and time
of their death.

How relieved they would be
to know exactly when
they would depart from
the great cunt of existence
in Malone’s own words
to plunge into the great lie
of the afterlife.

How happy they would be
if when they emerge into life
the good doctor
or the one responsible
for having expelled them
into existence
would tell them you will die at 15:30
on December 22, 1989.

Could Sam have written
I shall soon be quite dead at last
had he known in advance
when he would change tense?

Certainly not
because as Malone tells us
a bit further in his story

I shall die tepid
without enthusiasm.

Does that mean on the contrary
of those idiots on this bitch of an earth
who explode themselves with fervor
to reach the illusion of paradise
while taking with them other mortals
that Malone’s lack of enthusiasm
towards his own death is a clever way
of delaying the act of dying?

A lack of enthusiasm for something
is always a way of postponing
the terms of that something.

The soon of Malone mocks
the permanence of death
and his lack of enthusiasm
ridicules the expression at last.

And so before he reaches the end
of the first page of his story
Malone has already succeeded
in postponing his death to
Saint John the Baptist’s Day
and even the Fourteenth of July.
Malone even believes he might be able
to resist until the
Transfiguration
not to speak of the Assumption
which certainly throws some doubt
as to what really happened
on that mythical day
or what will happen to Malone
if he manages to hang on until then.

In fact Malone defies his own death
by giving himself
birth into death
as he explains at the end of his story.

All is ready. Except me. I am being
given, if I may venture the expression,
birth to into death, such is my impression.
The feet are clear already,
of the great cunt of existence.
Favorable presentation I trust.
My head will be the last to die.
Haul in your hands. I can’t.
The render rents, My story ended
I’ll be living yet. Promising lag.
That is the end of me. I shall say I no more.

Nothing more to add this evening.
Malone said it all for me.
I can go to sleep calmly now.
Good night everybody.

Raymond Federman

Dear Friends and more

this letter came to me out of nowhere
I'm still under shock
What will I say

I didn't know when I read this
if I should have tears in my eyes
or if I should burst into laughter


CLICK LETTER TO ENLARGE

UP OUT AND BLOWN AWAY*


every time I see a
blue bird I think of
Ronald Sukenick

maybe there was
a blue bird in one
of his stories

maybe there wasn't


Mike Daily



____
* Title by Raymond Federman.

-----Original Message-----
From: Mike Daily
To: Raymond Federman
Sent: Sun 22 Feb 2009 6:14 pm
Subject: title

Ray, can you think of a good title for this? Mike

-----Original Message-----
From: Raymond Federman
To: Mike Daily
Sent: Sun 2/22/09 9:15 PM
Subject: title

oh very easy

UP OUT AND BLOWN AWAY

-----Original Message-----
From: Raymond Federman
To: Mike Daily
Sent: Sun 2/22/09 9:16 PM
Subject: title

IF YOU WANT YOU CAN PUT THAT POEM ON MY BLOG
OF COURSE WITH YOUR NAME

Apocalypse Now

hey
you guys
over there
you humans
wait till Jesus really comes back
things will really get worse

if you humans
were smart
you would leap over
the second coming
directly into
the
apocalypse


Apocalypse Maintenant

hé
vous les gars
là-bas
vous les humains
attendaient que Jésus revienne
les choses iront encore plus mal

si les humains
étaient pas cons
ils sauteraient par-dessus
l’éternel retour
directement
dans
l’apocalypse

carcesses in portuguese‏

a good friend -- she's portuguese -- she wrote her doctoral dissertation about my work - just did a translation of the carcasses --

RAYMOND FEDERMAN, As carcassas
(tradução: Manuela Alves de Abreu)

Ontem comprei um novo gravador de voz – e hoje gravei nele uma história – e chamei essa história –

As carcassas

Estou sentado no meu escritório – é assim que começa a história que gravei – Estou sentado no meu escritório na Califórnia – San Diego Califórnia – pertinho do sol – há quatro anos mudei-me para cá para terminar o meu trabalho e fazer contas comigo mesmo – estou sentado à secretária e olho pela janela a vista esplêndida à minha frente – incríveis o vale a montanha as árvores o céu – é digno de se ver – magnífico – hoje um bom dia para mim – sinto-me bem – começou por uma boa partida de golfe esta manhã – consegui uns 81 – sim 81 – 38 nos 9 primeiros buracos – sete green em regulation - dois birdies – nos últimos buracos um 43 – dois miseráveis bogies - dois erros estúpidos – o espírito vagueia por vezes quando passeamos pela natureza – mas umas sólidas 81 pancadas não é nada mau para um velhote como eu – depois regresso a casa para trabalhar em O meu corpo em nove partes com os seus 3 suplementos – a versão em língua inglesa – My Body in Nine Parts – hoje trabalho as minhas cicatrizes – mas num momento de reflexão levantei os olhos lá para cima para as almofadas do céu e depois para a vista esplêndida à minha frente – incrível – e pensei – quando morreres tudo isto vai apagar-se – mais nada para ver – nothing more – apenas a escuridão – será como se mergulhasses num grande buraco negro – primeiro a cabeça que cortará o ar – e nesse rodopio para o abismo tudo ficará negro – mas pensar isso e dizê-lo assim só me compromete a mim – será que isso sugere a possibilidade de um depois – de um além – de outra forma de vida após a morte – como se me tivesse enganado toda a vida – não – não vou cair na grande patetice meta-pata-física - não – nada de passe de mágica – nada de mentira sobre-humana – nada de intervenção divina – sou um ser humano – sou consciente de ser um ser humano e até bem vivo – que se lixe o além - mas para brincar imagina agora que estás morto – lá estás tu na fila no meio da longa fila das carcassas mortas que acabam de chegar na zona das carcassas – sim é assim que se chama esta história – as carcassas – aqui estão elas – todas atoladas umas por cima das outras com velhas peles vazias – e agora estás tu por cima desse monte - todas atoladas umas por cima das outras à espera da sua vez de serem transmudadas – as velhas que esperam há muito tempo – as novas que acabam de chegar curiosas e ansiosas por saber quando serão transmudadas – pois a transmutação não se faz imediatamente - as carcassas não são logo reencarnadas quando chegam na zona das carcassas – há um período de espera – um período de incubação – se posso assim dizer – portanto estás ali à espera da tua vez – não há nenhum efeito de mágica como já disse – é preciso esperar que as autoridades se decidam – sim chamemo-lhes assim – as autoridades – as únicas que podem decidir quando vai ser a tua vez de ser transmudado – não me perguntes quem são essas autoridades nem onde se encontram – na zona das carcassas não se colocam tais perguntas – na zona das carcassas fecha-se a matraca se queremos ser transmudados - portanto um dia as autoridades convocam-te – eh tu aí chega aqui – e dizem-te que vais ser reenviado – mas não forçosamente para o planeta donde vens – as carcassas chegam de todos os lugares do universo – o lugar onde as carcassas ficam empilhadas é uma zona à parte no grande vazio do universo – ninguém sabe onde se situa exactamente esta zona – mas é como um enorme armazém – um pouco como a Samaritaine1 - aí encontramos carcassas de todos os tipos – de todos os tamanhos de todas as formas – a maior parte em mau estado – estão à espera que as autoridades as chamem para serem transmudadas – não se pode discutir com as autoridades – temos que aceitar a sua decisão – e então a tua vez chegou – lá estás tu de volta num planeta em insecto – sim – em mosca – imagina-te agora a viver a tua vida em mosca – primeiro a vida da mosca é curta – uma vida efémera como se diz – mesmo assim é uma vida – qual é o teu principal objectivo nesta vida de mosca – a tua razão de ser – primeiro morfar a merda das outras espécies - zumbir – sim zumbir à volta dos olhos das vacas que não param de te mandar bofetadas valentes com a cauda – ou zumbir à volta dos humanos – à procura da merda nos vidros das janelas ou nos ecrãs das televisões – mas um dia quando aterras no braço ou no cimo do crânio dum homenzinho – zás - esmaga-te com a mão – esmaga-te – extermina-te e voltas a ser carcassa – que tipo de vida é esta – e lá estás de novo na zona das carcassas – ah já voltaste dizem-te aqueles que ainda lá estão à seca – o tempo passa – não o tempo não passa porque nesta zona das carcassas o tempo não anda – não há tempo – não há nada – mas mesmo assim agora a tua vez chega depressa - não há nenhuma razão para isso – não se questionam as autoridades – desta vez reenviam-te em flor – uma bela rosa vermelha no pequeno jardim de um desses novos ricos dos subúrbios que moram na costa californiana – estás orgulhosa porque sabes que és bela e que cheiras bem – e as senhoras que vêm visitar a senhora burguesa para jogar bridge olham para ti e dizem – oh que bela rosa – mas um dia a dona da casa pede à criada para colher uma das flores do jardim e para a colocar num vaso na sala de jantar – a criada chega então com uma tesoura e corta o teu caule – depois coloca-te num vaso com água – mas muito rapidamente a água começa a cheirar mal – torna-se insuportável – e começas a murchar e a murchar e a dona da casa diz à criada deite fora esta flor murcha – então a criada verte a água salobra na banca e deita-te ao lixo – e lá estás tu de novo entre as carcassas – que tipo de vida era essa – ficas à espera novamente – esperas muito tempo desta vez – talvez mais de dois séculos – até mais – mas como o tempo não existe na zona das carcassas não te dás conta de quanto tempo ficas à espera – mas chateias-te – estás farto – gostavas de ser transmudado mais uma vez – invejas as carcassas que são reenviadas – estás-te nas tintas para aquilo que poderias ser logo que te transmudem – e finalmente as autoridades chamam-te e dizem-te que és chamado para o meio dos leões de África – há uma penúria de leões machos no planeta Terra – a maior parte dos leões ficaram estéreis – por isso aqui estás em África – no Quénia no meio de três leoas muito sexys e de um bando de jovens leõezinhos – cada quinze minutos – isto foi escrupulosamente observado pelos caçadores de leões durante observações científicas – uma das leoas vem te titilar para uma partida de cambalhota – levantas-te do teu canto à sombra de uma grande árvore exótica – montas a leoa dás uma queca e voltas para a sombra da árvore exótica sonhar com outra vida – rica em alimentos – as leoas ficam atentas a isso – muita carne de gazela – e depois tem graça brincar com os filhotes – mas um dia chegam homens de cor diferente – os negros são meio nus e dançam – os brancos trazem chapéus coloniais esquisitos e espingardas - mas não estão aí para fazer de ti uma carcassa – querem capturar-te – apanham-te numa grande rede – metem-te num barco ou num avião e mandam-te para aquilo a que chamam a sociedade civilizada – por sorte para ti – não te instalaram no zoo de Buffalo onde terias ficado enjaulado o resto da vida deitando-te e enrolando-te na tua própria merda – sem poder montar nenhuma dessas leoas sexys – de qualquer modo agora que já não podes galgar livremente pela natureza já não fazes exercício – és incapaz de entesar o pau – mas que sorte para ti – instalaram-te no zoo de San Diego – magnífico zoo – até construíram para ti aquilo a que chamam lá um ambiente natural – claro que é aldrabice – isto é tipicamente a Califórnia – não há nada de natural neste ambiente que construíram para ti – é puro cenário de Hollywood – sabes disso – sabes que é tudo mentira – mas fazes de conta que és feliz para que os humanos fiquem contentes para não te mandarem para o zoo de Buffalo – mas chateias-te a valer neste ambiente Walt Disney – dormes a maior parte do tempo – ou fazes de conta que dormes – sobretudo quando trazem os miúdos para que os assustes - gostavam de te ver feroz – mas ficas calmo – por vezes um humano pica-te no rabo para que reajas – e tu rosnas – que tipo de vida é esta – está bem – dão-te a comer bons nacos de carne – essencialmente carne de boi - mas um dia trazem-te um pedaço de carne podre – e morres da doença da vaca louca – e eis que voltas de novo para o meio das carcassas – bom – não vou imaginar todas as possibilidades animais ou humanas ou vegetais nas quais poderias reencarnar – imagina-te voltar em rabanete – ou em alcachofra – concordo em árvore não é mau – uma grande árvore majestosa – um carvalho soberbo – desta vez estás satisfeito – as árvores duram muito tempo – mas aí todas as árvores à tua volta têm inveja de ti porque és o maior – ou porque o teu tronco é o mais grosso – mais sólido que o delas – ou porque a tua folhagem é mais verdejante – ignora-as porque ser uma árvore é sem dúvida uma bela forma de vida – mas um dia um ser humano chega com uma serra eléctrica e corta-te para fazer de ti lenha para queimar – que tipo de vida é esta – e eis que voltas de novo para o meio das carcassas – e reflectes enquanto esperas a tua vez ou a tua volta – bem sei que as carcassas mortas não costumam reflectir - mas para a comodidade desta história digamos que as carcassas são capazes de pensar – por isso pensas – por que não posso ter uma palavra a dizer – por que não posso eu próprio decidir o que hei de ser da próxima vez – por que não posso inventar o meu próprio... – ia dizer futuro – bem digamos apenas a minha própria carcassa – imagina agora que sejas um escritor numa dessas tuas transmutações – e que compões uma mensagem muito estilizada destinada às autoridades – imagina que nessa mensagem lhes dizes que talvez tenha chegado o tempo em que as carcassas têm alguma palavra a dizer a respeito das suas transmutações – e imagina que daí se segue uma balbúrdia na zona das carcassas – por todos os lados – discussões – debates – sondagens – e todo tipo de coisas do género – imagina que finalmente as autoridades concordem – as carcassas podem elas próprias decidir sob que forma voltar – é um processo muito longo e complexo mas podes eventualmente decidir por ti só o que queres ser – eu por exemplo disse muitas vezes que gostava de voltar em gladiador romano – assim poderia comandar a revolta contra um imperador romano – ou voltar em mosqueteiro – ou em french lover – ou em – em – em – merda não é fácil decidirmos de que forma gostaríamos de voltar – por isso penso que o melhor que possa fazer aqui – quero dizer nesta história – é deixar os leitores escolherem por si a forma sob a qual gostariam de voltar – e se esta história chegasse a ser publicada – digamos na Nouvelle Revue Française – aí insistia para que a última página ficasse virgem para que os leitores pudessem escrever nela o que gostariam de ser na sua próxima vida – claro um dia – quando a ciência tiver progredido – as carcassas serão talvez capazes de voltar em objectos – imagina voltar em fogão a gás ou em barbeador eléctrico – ou melhor até – em taco de golfe – oh que vida interessante seria essa – serias um driver Taylor Made titanium 360 novinho em folha com uma vareta em grafite – seria uma vida excitante – pelo menos até que o golfista te ache culpado das suas pancadas falhadas e decida comprar uma carcassa reencarnada em King Cobra 560 driver com uma vareta anti-slice – e te atire para o meio do lixo – imagina que vida pode ser essa – olha a noite caiu – a vista esplendida à minha frente desapareceu na escuridão por traz da janela – para mim está na hora de acabar esta história – carrego na tecla off do gravador – bem volto para o meu trabalho de Mon corps en neuf parties – acerca das minhas cicatrizes – e esqueçamos as carcassas –

____
1 Ndt La Samaritaine é o nome de um dos grandes armazéns de Paris.

A former student of mine -- Chuck Richardson -- who took several of my creative writing courses at SUNY-Buffalo wrote an amazing piece about The Carcasses. Back then Chuck proved to be a fine young writer. He's publishing his first novel. We exchanged a few emails, and I sent him The Carcasses -- several sections of that book in progress already appear on the blog -- so visitors of the Federman blog will know what this very perceptive reading of that book refers to.

I'm getting better here -- stronger every day -- started writing again and even playing golf.

Raymond

Dear Raymond,

I’m deeply honored that you shared this. I’m sorry it took a little while to respond. I was a bit worried you sent me something that would render me speechless, but you’re writing something that puts my head in its favorite place. And I can say things from there even if they’re nonsense. So here goes some nonsense.

The first relative thing I thought of while reading was The Tibetan Book of the Dead, or Book of Natural Salvation, which I prefer [Huston Smith translation], and Kafka’s Parables and Paradoxes and some of his other short work [I wrote something about K.’s short work that Mauro Nevi posted on The Kafka Project. I’m not a scholar or expert, I just love Kafka]. Both of those works have made huge impressions on me.

What cemented the Tibetan connection in my mind was when you write “…it must be terrible to come back to life…and live each time with the fear of death.” The detachment sought by Tibetan Buddhists to achieve natural salvation in harmony with the wheel of life seems akin to the narrator’s search in Carcasses [which, for some reason, I keep pronouncing “caucuses” in my head]. There’s a part in the Tibetan book where the soul, moments before it enters the womb, begs the man and woman to stop copulating because it so dreads a return to life on Earth.

Also, the authorities seem somewhat akin to the Buddhist gods [manifestations of personal desire…though now I think I’m going astray a bit] that represent aspects of the human soul [whatever that is—it doesn’t seem to be mind, matter or energy, or even a combination thereof, the way you’re dealing with it, but something else elsewhere, an “I/eye” beyond language].

And for some reason, on page 3 I couldn’t help thinking about “The Law.” There’s something about Kafka’s approach to [] in The Law that seems a counterweight to what’s going on here. I can’t put my finger on it yet, though. I also couldn’t stop thinking of A Report for an AcademyIn The Penal Colony. The work seems to be creating an expectation for some sort of testimony in a trial about a cosmic torture mechanism that fatally tattoos prisoners of the flesh/mind/energy.

Somewhere in this psychological seam between the Tibetan Book of Natural Salvation and Kafka [of course, this is the way I’m reading it, I won’t guess what your intentions were/are] the question is asked on p. 10 “why can’t I choose what I’m going to be?” Normally I’d scream out “karma” as an answer, but you’re getting into the karma of karma [Meta-karma?] and I’m waiting to see what you do with it.

And the narrator seems to have fnacs dancing around Satan’s rebellious role in Heaven by calling for a democratic transmutation of the dead—politicizing metamorphosis, the apparent essence of nature itself. There’s a rebellion against karma and nature as well as paradise that, upon some thought, seems absented from the text. The narrator, perhaps seeking a change in the cosmic process enveloping him, still seems rather sanguine about everything, as if it humors “him,” but that’s not all, “he” doesn’t really find it all that amusing, I think. I anticipate that hole, what the narrator is not amused about, perhaps getting bigger, or just the right size, attaining its own balance or imbalance or not [I’m also thinking this second how karma, nature and paradise are three different things; how Jaffe says “find a seam, plant a mine and slip away;” how Acker wanted to “explode the duality;” Federman is expanding/exploding duality into a tri-ality, finding a seam among [not between] karma [indefinable], nature [indefinable]and paradise [the same], fostering an emergency that might be described as a triaxial esemplasy [an expansion of Barth’s co-axial esemplasy…your play gives me psychologorrhea][sic].

At the same time, when this word-being asks why she can’t choose what she’s going to be, a quote from Bukowski pops to mind: “I never met another man I’d rather be.” This striving and longing to be something other than what we are seems futile. The fact too many seem forced to be something they’re not appears unjust. Yet futile injustice seems to be what is—what seams—from a human perspective. So you go beyond that, pointing where we need to go, pointing to that mystery we are strangely attracted to throughout our phase space trajectories toward that black hole at the center of our Existence, a seaming recursive symmetry across scale and aspect.

This is not a human-centered text, it’s not even biocentric, since there’s a likelihood at some point in our eternities we’re going to come back as a piss pot. I appreciate the flexible topology, the permeability of self, the apparent possibility of some future enlightenment/escape from the karma…in the end these feelings are all irrelevant, so much freedom that freedom’s meaningless. Yet we care…what does that mean?

On p. 22 I also started thinking of Camus’ The Rebel, basically about the way rebels have no idea what to do once they’re in power, other than take control of the existing mechanisms for its administration, finding themselves in the end only corrupted by and addicted to the apparatus/mechanism/system they sought to manipulate to their advantage. The main thing is, from my point, is the shift in psyche, an end to our crisis of perception, or the further evolution of it into evermore life-full experiences. I don't know. But that's a minor point, this common view of the rebel that unlike most common perceptions seems uncommonly accurate, at least from my experience. What is the actual recursion between these functions? I wonder.

I know this is a rough draft and there were a few typos. Perhaps these were typos or not, and I’m pretty sure they’re on or right around p. 3, you type “Wall-Mart” and “dinning table.” Each are better spellings, in my opinion, than what the dictionary offers, for whatever that’s worth. I like happy accidents in my own work. In fact, all the stuff I enjoy most is a happy accident.

Finally, I’d say I see mind, matter and energy seeking to sustain their inter-related disequilibria for as long as possible [an unsentimental journey with a dash of Calvino’s “lightness,” perhaps?].

Again, I’m very honored and I hope I haven’t said too much or made an ass of myself [though I’m rather used to both]. When I’m working on things I like to hear what a reader's reading contrasted with what I think I'm writing. And I also don’t like hearing too much. Hope I kept this short enough. I apologize for the sloppy somewhat incoherent remarks but they come from a reading in progress.

Can’t wait to see more Carcasses [I sound like Idi Amin!]--can’t wait to see how this fable works itself out [just occurs to me I said nothing about fables or the fabulous...]

Peace & Cheers,
Chuck

to put it in a few words medically speaking

feeling much better each day each day more or less going for a walk further and further driving the car even went to the movies and the casino a couple of times since the operation on election day which shows that I am doing okay even if during the night unable to sleep on the left side where I am always the most comfortable and have my best dreams I have to sleep flat on my back and that prevents me from not only sleeping but from having good dreams I would describe the position in which I am forced to remain because of the long incision on the left side of my body an incision that goes from my pubic hair half way up my back around the waist so to speak I would describe that position flat on my back as being semi-nocturnal rather than totally nocturnal whatever that means a condition during which I contemplate my mortality or as the poet once put it where je hume ici ma future fumèe ...

otherwise not much else to report

Erica takes good care of me and so soon I will be back to the Federman I was before ... before ... you know what I mean yes soon quand le vent se lèvera il faudra tenter de vivre as the poet once put it

oh a very good and long review of Pssst [the German Chut] in the Frankfurter Raunchau -- and another one coming soon in FAZ, I am told

Stefan Weidle the publisher informs me that Pssst has been awarded a prize as one of the most beautiful books of 2008

Stefan didn't say if there was money coming with that honor or just a medal or a certificate

in any case all that helps the morale

we got hit hard by the economic crisis [the Bush Crisis it should be called] so Erica announced the other day after she visited what's left of my pension of a poor retired [distinguished] professor she declared calmly that we had lost two years of life -- implying that we should consider changing tense two years earlier than anticipated because the cash has run out – so it goes

well I said joyfully this way we'll be back to where it all started back to the marvelous beginning of our grand wild glorious chaotic adventure towards ... towards ... just towards ... whatever is out there in the great cunt of the universe as old Sam once put it and this way I added we will have gone full circle from poor to rich [and almost famous] back to poor in and all our problems will be resolved -- so be it!

Raymond Federman

Venez me rejoindre sur mon blog http://mariedelvigne.com

Marie Delvigne

I'm out of the hospital with only one kidney now

doing ok

remember how Frank Sinatra used to sing

I LEFT MY HEART IN SAN FRANCISCO

well Federman is writing a song
that goes like this

I LEFT MY KIDNEY IN SAN DIEGO